Medics Are Struggling To Respond To The World's Worst Ebola Outbreak

Red Cross workers carry the body of a woman who died of the Ebola virus during a 1995 outbreak in the Congo.

DAKAR/HAVANA(Reuters) - The death toll from the world's worst ever #Ebola outbreak in West Africa has risen to 603 since February, with at least 68 deaths reported from three countries in the region in the last week alone, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday.

WHO said there were 85 new cases between July 8-12, highlighting continued high levels of transmission. International and local medics were struggling to get access to communities as many people feared outsiders were spreading rather than fighting Ebola.

"It's very difficult for us to get into communities where there is hostility to outsiders," WHO spokesman Dan Epstein told a news briefing in Geneva. "We still face rumors, and suspicion and hostility ... People are isolated, they're afraid, they're scared."

Sierra Leone recorded the highest number of deaths, which include confirmed, probable and suspect cases of Ebola, with 52. Liberia reported 13 and Guinea 3, according to the WHO figures.

Epstein said the main focus in the three countries is tracing people who have been exposed to others with Ebola and monitoring them for the 21-day incubation period to see if they were infected.

"It's probably going to be several months before we are able to get a grip on this epidemic," Epstein added.

Ebola causes fever, vomiting, bleeding and diarrhea and was first detected in then Zaire, now Democratic Republic of Congo, in the mid-1970s. Spread through contact with blood and body fluids of infected people or animals, it is one of the world's deadliest viruses, killing up to 90 percent of those infected.

Speaking from Havana, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan called the outbreak the world's worst ever by number of cases, saying, "The situation is serious but not out of control yet."

The WHO was mobilizing political, religious and local leaders in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea to create a better welcome for medical professionals attempting to treat victims, Chan said, while also coordinating responses from the three affected countries and eight neighbors that have experienced Ebola.

"Sometimes the challenge for us is countries like to do disease control their way. But I think this is one such situation where countries must come together and adopt a similar approach to deal with a very dangerous disease," Chan said.

The organization was also consulting with anthropologies to help suspend local customs such as eating bush meat or hugging and kissing Ebola victims at their funerals, which can transmit the disease, Chan said.

The outbreak started in Guinea's remote southeast but has spread across the region's porous borders despite aid workers scrambling to help some of the world's weakest health systems tackle a deadly, infectious disease.

In Sierra Leone and Guinea, experts believe scores of patients are being hidden as relatives and friends believe hospitalization is a "death sentence". In Liberia, health workers have been chased away by armed gangs. Business Insider

15 dead as trouble erupts at DR Congo soccer match

KINSHASA : Fifteen people were killed and 21 others injured after trouble broke out at a football match in the DR #Congo capital Kinshasa on Sunday, during which police fired tear gas at fans, officials said.

The death toll was announced by Kinshasa governor Andre Kimbuta, who rushed with the country’s Interior Minister Richard Muyej to the hospital where many of the dead and injured were taken. “The current toll... is 15 dead and 21 injured,” he said.

The match was an important play-off between popular teams ASV Club and Tout Puissant Mazembe. ASV Club supporters became agitated as their team were being beaten, #UN-created Radio Okapi reported.
“They began hurling projectiles onto the pitch, forcing the referee to stop the match repeatedly,” the radio report continued. The match ended in a hail of stones thrown from the stands where fighting broke out, the national television station said.

Police fired tear gas cannisters into the crowd, there was a stampede in the stands “and in this confusion a stadium wall collapsed,” Radio Okapi reported.

Tout Puissant Mazembe were a goal ahead when the trouble started.
The precise cause of the deaths was not immediately clear.

An enquiry was launched into the disaster “to identify those responsible,” said Kimbuta.
Before the match dozens of police officers were deployed around the Tata Raphael stadium, following trouble at previous matches between the two sides. ASV Club is a very popular Kinshasa football club.

Multiple champions TP Mazembe are based in Lubumbashi in the south-east and are linked to businessman Moise Katumbi, governor of the rich mining province of Katanga, of which Lubumbashi is the capital.
Source: The Nation News